Skinny Love
by G. Wordsmith
Summary: Definition: A love that is too unnourished and weightless to last. "I don't know," He whimpered. "I don't know if it's our love that's wasting away, or us."


Alice tucked herself in to the curve of Franks curled body as she made soft snores and whimpers in between breaths. She tossed herself around to get comfortable but it had only resulted in a worried nurse coming to calm her down with a strip of bubble gum and her sickeningly sweet voice that made her sound like a princess from the stories in the Beedle and the Bard. She quickly chewed the gum and spit it out, claiming to have resolved her 'panic attack'. Then, she tucked the chewing gum wrapper into the cup of her bra so she could gift it to the brown haired boy who she and Frank were so fond of, Neville, was it? Neville.

Slowly, Frank's snores began to soften, and his body twitched moderately. She had spent countless nights by his side to know what he did when he was about to wake up. She dreaded this. She dreaded when they were both awake and strange faces would visit them, telling stories about _their _past. It was like they were forming horrors, unimaginable ones with the flick of their tongue to remind them that this was what made them insane. She protested, screamed at them, told more than half of them, 'to get the fuck away' but after so many days, so many years, it started to make sense and she began to believe them. Maybe, this was why she was mental, because some bloody death eaters tortured them into dying patients because Frank and Alice thrice defied 'he-who-must-not-be-named'. She would say his name, it would be like giving the guy respect if they kept calling him 'you-know-who' when she really didn't know who and most importantly, he didn't fucking deserve it but she didn't know his name, so she stuck to that.

When Frank woke up, he pressed into her a little tighter so she curled into his curve snugly. He kissed her forehead and then lifted her chin with his index finger and kissed her lips, softly and then harder. But, it didn't feel like love anymore, not like those nights they spent reminding each other that they did and they always would, reminding each other that they weren't insane just forgotten. Sweating profusely and laughing, scaring nurses with faked attacks and night terrors. Making cities at the bottom of the bed with chewing gum wrappers and then destroying the town, grabbing the paper wrappers that were clenched in their fists and then, soon enough, they were 'making it snow'. It was the closest they ever came to winter because when you're insane you lose the idea of outside because you're forever locked in the white box. They learned that quite quickly. People died trying to find their way out, living in their own world a little too much, it was suicide. But, they had each other to keep them alive and this was love.

But now, it was skinny. It was anorexic; it was on a diet when it never needed one. It hadn't realized that the fuller it was the better. Soon, chewing gum wrappers were only used to gift Neville, the only boy, well person, that hadn't worried to touch them or look at them. Soon, the white box was no longer filled with laughing or heavy breathing. It was filled with silence and they never spoke of it, they never told each other that they were losing everything now. Not just their mind, not just their bodies and lives but their love. Today, the silence was broken.

"Alice."

She turned her head to look at him and caught herself staring at his eyes, but she didn't break away. She continued to just gaze but this wasn't a gaze filled with desire or understanding, it was a gaze trying to bring back the before, feel the way she did about his eyes and his lips and the way his eyebrows twitched every so often but it wasn't working and the fact that she called her 'Alice' and not 'Honey' or 'Love' wasn't helping.

"I don't know," He whimpered. "I don't know if it's our love that is wasting away, or _us._"

"It's always been _us_, Frank. But now, now it's both." She told him.

It was true and it never had felt so right to tell him something that would hurt him.

And soon their dying days were coming and soon all of this wouldn't have mattered and all of this would be forgotten but isn't it always nice to know? That his love was unnourished and weightless, it was dying just like everything else in the world. And eventually, didn't everything have to go? Wasn't death the only certainty in life? And there, there was the peace.

"Ours is a skinny love." He said.

"A skinny love that's dying."


End file.
